A Brief History of Iraq for Westerners

Iraq was saved from ignorant subhuman barbarism by a gentlewoman named Gertrude at the time that the civilized nations of the world were, in a quite advanced and sophisticated manner, slaughtering their young men in a project now called the First World War.

Because the Arabs were too backward to be allowed to govern themselves, or even to contemplate creating a world war, and because tribes and ethnicities and religions never really garner much loyalty or support that can’t be wiped away with a good cup of tea or a few clouds of poison gas, and because the French were too dumb to know where the oil was, it became necessary for the British to install an Iraqi leader who wasn’t Iraqi, through a democratic election with one candidate running.

The great Winston Churchill explained the governance of Iraq and the new civilizing technique of bombing civilians thusly: “I am strongly in favor of using poison gas against uncivilized tribes.” Others failed to see the wisdom, and the Royal Air Force usednon-chemical “terror bombing, night bombing, heavy bombers, [and] delayed action bombs (particularly lethal against children)” to police disobedient Iraqis. Only by developing these techniques on Iraqis were the world’s civilizers prepared to use them on Nazis when the time came to level German cities in the name of defeating Nazis, which of course also places the rest of this paper beyond the reach of moral criticism.

Iraqis, from the formation of Iraq by Gertrude to this day, were never quite able to create a democracy for the CIA to overthrow as in neighboring Iran. But the idea that Iraqis have been violent or resistant to control because of lack of representation misses the central fact that people in the Middle East enjoy killing each other over sectarian differences. Of course it’s hard to find evidence of significant sectarian fighting in Iraq prior to 2003 and some say there wasn’t any. There was violent looting of Jewish neighborhoods in 1941, but the British government keeps all information on that event secret. There was bombing of synagogues in Baghdad in 1950-51 but that turned out to have been done by Zionists trying to convince Jews to come to Israel. And “until the 1970s nearly all Iraq’s political organisations were secular, attracting people from all religions and none.” But what was simmering just below the surface waiting to burst out at the slightest scratching?

Think how little it took. Supporting and arming a brutal dictator in Saddam Hussein and his catastrophic war against Iran, then bombing Iraq and imposing the most murderous sanctions in history, and then newly bombing Iraq and occupying it for 8 years while arming and training death squads and torturers and imposing sectarian segregation, creating 5 million refugees, and killing a half-million to a million-and-a-half people, while devastating the nation’s infrastructure, and then imposing a puppet government loyal to one sect and one neighboring nation. That, plus arming the new government for vicious attacks on its own people, while arming mad killers in neighboring Syria, some of whom want to combine parts of Syria and Iraq: that was all it took, and suddenly, out of nowhere, ignorant Arabs are killing each other, just out of pure irrationality, just like in Palestine.

During the 8 years of U.S.-led occupation people mistook purely irrational violence that had been bubbling under the surface for centuries for resistance to the occupiers, and now some imagine that part of the violence against the puppet government is motivated by grievances against that government. But this misses the fundamental truths here, which are:

1. Shock and Awe was meant to put people at ease and make them comfortable.

2. The plan to rid Iraq of weapons it was about to use against those of us who matter was successful beyond the wildest expectations, working retroactively by a decade.

3. Our great leaders, Bush and Cheney, meant well in giving Iraqis freedom even if they weren’t ready for it.

4. The election of Maliki was even more legitimate than the election of Faisal.

5. When the Bush-Maliki treaty ended the U.S. military presence in Iraq, that was thanks to President Obama who is way smarter than Bush but couldn’t get Iraq to let U.S. troops stay with immunity for crimes — crimes of course being necessary for policing, just ask Winnie.

6. When Iraq remained a disaster, that was President Obama’s fault for focusing too much on murdering people in Afghanistan and Pakistan and Yemen, and never Iraq — as if we just don’t care about Iraq any more.

7. The U.S. weapons being seized and used against the U.S. puppet government in Iraq are no match for the vast stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction that we can and must ship into Iraq now to be seized and redirected later on down the road.

1 comment

If one wants to begin to understand the Middle East, Robert Fisk’s “The Great War for Civilization” is required reading. Nonetheless, 1300 pages of detailed history is not going to be read by everyone, and yet this area of the world is important to all of us.

The Middle East, or any area of the world, is rich in history, meaning, and impact on our lives whether we realize it or are conscious of it. Oil is one reason for this, but not the only, of course.

I am reluctant to try to quote something that I believe Noam Chomsky said once about how what he writes can be understood by others, but that it does take time to read and try to understand the themes he writes and speaks about. In my own experience, I imagine that apart from my work, I spend an hour or two a day reading books and articles from many sources, and have done this for many years. Websites like this one have proven to be invaluable, and several minutes a day reviewing and selecting articles to read are well worth the time.

David Swanson’s articles are some of those I have come to value greatly, and this one, along with reading about “Gertrude,” is quite remarkable and required, especially in light of current events and what looks like to be continued and renewed attacks in Iraq by U.S. forces. If one has that feeling of deja vu, there is good reason for it, of course. This time around will not be exactly like what has come before, history and current events are much more than repetition. But this article by Swanson covers much ground in a few words.